Happy Hallowe'en! Grim Fandangal!

Happy Hallowe'en, my friends! I hope your weekend is ghoulishly good! 

L called my look "Grim Fandangal", which is a play off Grim Fandango, a PC game I used to have that had a wonderful Mexican Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) design.

• Dress - handmade, no label, vintage 60s; last worn here for Hallowe'en 2011
• Shoes - Half Truth Veda, Fluevog; last seen here for our rock & roll holiday earlier this month

I also wore my fluffy Noa Noa underskirt to give the dress more volume on the bottom - I twirled all over the office.

Pretty standard easy costume.

Add a wig and Vizzini looks at me cautiously.

"Must eat that flower."

This costume actually worked pretty well to function through a work day - I always have to wear my glasses too, so I have to factor that in.

I had a few odd looks while I walked around town

The stuff:

Wonderful shoes. I walked to and from town in them.

Spooky bling:

I wore four spiders!

• Leather obi - thrifted
• Rose - Le Chateau
• Cuffs - Jezebel Charms, gift from L
• Spider ring - homegrown vintage c. 1986, gift from Mom and Dad
• Teeny spider stud - gift from Marian
• Spider earrings - gift from Cindy

If you're interested in how I did my make-up, which was easily the most elaborate part of my costume, get ready for some giant pictures of my face. I did a test run last night to make sure I could do my complicated make-up, and I took pictures as I went along.

Hey if you're not interested, then run away now  - giant pictures of my face!

I didn't really have time for a costume, so aside from pulling stuff out of my regular clothes, I thought I could do a more fun thing and paint my face. I've been watching Face Off, and got all inspired.

I really liked this picture that I found. I had this cool glittery make-up palette that I thought could work, and I bought this two-ended felt/brush eyeliner to make it easier. The eyeliner (Marcelle) was excellent - it was waterproof, so I had no smudging all day, even through lunch. The glitter was horrible.

I started with a clean face and my hair pulled back, and put on a light base of white.

My skeptical face

I hated the feel of the white, but I soldiered on.

I used the brush side to start outlining, to get a feel for the balance on my face.

From there, I tried adding glitter to it, and it was the worst, goopiest stuff ever! I had to scrub my face clean and start over.

Muah-mwah.

Then I tried to shade around my eyes with eye shadow.

Did not like this.

Start over - bare face with some BB cream and powder, not white stuff, and hell, let's try the thick felt tip, shall we?

Hey-oh! Yes, this is much better. The more you try, the more the more you see what works and what doesn't.

I added some shading with grey eyeshadow.

If one eye works on the test run, no need to waste pen on the second eye. I tried this toothy mouth.

Not quite me - how about a little bow mouth?

Oh, yes, I think we are ready!

This is what I used:

My Rimmel BB cream followed by MAC Studio Fix powder for a nice smooth finish. I drew on my face with the felt-tip end, shaded with my MAC dark grey eyeshadow (spider web and jawline), plus a bit of blue from my MAC Toledo special edition blue for the flower on my chin. All reds supplied by a nice matt lip gloss (I forget which one).

Et viola!

A totally fun make-up look in less than half an hour. Thank goodness for the test run!